Reasons
by ardy1
Summary: My turn to start a drabble collection. You know, a series of oneshots, generally pretty short. This will include my musings on the avatarverse in general, and yes, sometimes on the characters as well.
1. The Law

A/N: In "Zuko Alone" we finally learn that Iroh had been in line to become Fire Lord. The was written in response to a challenge prompt on TheAvatar100 community.

Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Air-bender. Don't own it, can't claim it. 

"It was his dying wish."

And Iroh had abided by his father's wishes his entire life. His father's will was law.

Iroh married the woman his father chose, although she suited him ill.

He took his place in command of his father's armies, although he would have preferred to study music.

He cut a swath through the Earth Kingdom so fierce as to earn a new title, his country's admiration, and his father's approval. He would have liked to pause to admire the architecture, sample the wines, and love the women. But his father's will was law.

In time, he could follow his own will. In time.

And he brought his own son in the army, for he too must learn what it meant to lead.

But Lu Ten fell. The Spirit World beckoned. And Iroh returned a changed man.

To find his brother Ozai's will was law.


	2. Luddites' Hindsight

A/N: Why did the Fire Nation attack in the first place? This was written in response to a challenge prompt on TheAvatar100 community.

Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Air-bender. Don't own it, can't claim it. 

The great forests were gone, their timber having built the cities and fueled the smelting forges. The mountainsides were scarred with open pits and mine tailings. The villages were empty and the fields barren, as the factories devoured all available labor.

When the maw of progress demanded more, he could not ask again of his own.

Thus it should have come as no surprise that Sozen looked abroad.


	3. A Possible Beginning

A/N: I'm not into any particular pairings, but if Zuko and Katara were to get together, this is how it might start…

Disclaimer: Avatar: the Last Airbender happily belongs to those clever enough to make it pretty damned wonderful. Not, thank goodness, to me.

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"Thanks, for sharing your hiding place" Katara whispered, her gratitude multiplied by her initial dismay in finding her chosen shelter already occupied by her enemy.

"Don't bother thanking me. Everyone knows you and the avatar are practically joined at the hip. With my luck, if you had been caught leaving they would have searched here, looking for him, and found me. No thanks." He paused briefly. "Where is your other half, anyway?"

"As if I'd tell you. And he's not my other half!"

He shrugged, "Whatever."

"Well. Thanks anyway…" She turned to go, the noise of soldiers' boots on cobblestone dying away.

"Wait! Don't you know anything? There are two more units sweeping this area over the next fifteen minutes." He rolled his eyes as he pulled her back deeper into the dark recess, one arm encircling her waist, the other hand over her mouth.

Minutes passed, and she realized he hadn't released her, even after it was clear the second patrol had passed by. Drawing attention to the fact by protesting or pulling away at this point seemed a bit awkward. On the other hand, doing nothing seemed to suggest acceptance, and she wasn't sure that was the right message either.

It crossed Zuko's mind that he currently held an armful of pretty waterbender, the very waterbender who had nearly beaten him at the oasis and frankly humiliated him on the tundra. Surely there was some means of turning this opportunity to his advantage, perhaps a chance at some form of payback? He pulled her yet closer, his hand moving from her mouth to her jaw-line.

"What do you think you are doing?" She asked, alarm evident in her voice, even as a whisper.

His trademark smirk evidenced itself. "Ah, just passing the time…"

And he bent his lips to hers, intent on imposing his will upon her. Her lips were surprising in their coolness, full and yielding. He allowed himself an extra moment to savor the unexpected pleasure of this contact. And then extended the kiss some more, partly because it simply felt so good, and partly to delay any reaction on her part because suddenly he wasn't sure how he would handle it.

When he finally pulled away, Katara gulped hard. Now _that_ had been unexpected! What was he thinking, anyway? How dare he! And then she knew it was purely to unsettle her. Well, he needn't think he would win at that game, either! She determined to ignore her suddenly weakened knees and heightened pulse.

"Really, Zuko, weren't you taught any better? If you're going to do something, do it right!" She stood on tip-toe, both hands pulling his face back down to hers. Her lips reaching his were parted, and she boldly probed his teeth with her tongue.

In his surprise he responded by meeting her tongue with his, and a shock wave of moist heat transmitted through both their bodies, obliterating for a sweet duration all sense of position, ambition, history and hatred. Now arms entwined and bodies clenched together, and for a few glorious seconds - minutes? - each was lost in a primeval recognition of what it meant to be male and female, together.

Katara's sanity returned first, and she nearly jerked away in panic. But she remembered that she had initiated this kiss, albeit to show Zuko he couldn't intimidate her – she certainly had not expected him to arouse her! The echoes of passing boots indicated that the final patrol had passed, and she gently but firmly pulled herself away from Zuko's embrace.

"If we are keeping score," she said, her eyes gleaming in a way he could not interpret, "I think I can claim this encounter in my column." And she slipped away as he fought to catch his breath and equilibrium.

"Believe me," he said, although he feared he spoke only to the darkening night as he tried to follow her passage, "I'm looking forward to another rematch."


	4. Little Things That Don't Matter

A/N The challenge this time was "Little Things". Humor had already been done so well – it was time to look elsewhere.

Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Air-bender. Don't own it, can't claim it. 

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She would have laughed, had it been in her nature, but she rarely laughed.

Although she smiled, when provoked.

So many reasons to hate her uncle, perhaps most how he stood steadfast in support of her errant brother.

Certainly for his hesitancy in using the awesome limits of fire-bending.

Of course, for walking away from almost certain victory at Bah Sing Sei.

No longer because he stood in the way of her father.

Not at all because of a doll, given years ago, clearly without thought or care.

A doll, wearing Earth Kingdom clothes! As if she would care!

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And a perfect 100 words it is!


	5. Hesitation

A/N: Rashaka wrote what she referred to as an "insta-fic" challenge around the prompt "I don't really know you at all," came the whisper. "But if I did…"

Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Airbender is not now nor ever will be owned by me. Bummer.

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Title: Hesitation

Word Count: 190

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It had been quick, so quick that Aang and Sokka had no time to do anything but watch as the two combatants hammered away at each other. The night air roared with flame, crackled with sharding ice, and hissed with the meeting of the two.

Without the full moon or the flooding river to aid her, would Katara have succeeded in pinning the fire prince to a nearby tree? Sokka swiftly bent to claim the broadsword Zuko had dropped early on, as Aang rushed to put a hand on Katara's shoulder, restraining her from the final, killing blow of an ice dagger. He was startled at the fierceness in her blue eyes, and by the coldness in Zuko's answering gaze.

"I don't really know you at all," came the whisper. "But if I did, would it make any difference?" Aang knew with that question that Katara really didn't want to hurt Zuko.

"Maybe if you did, you wouldn't have hesitated," his response was so low, she might not have heard it, but that her arm fell forward, and the ice buried itself in his chest.


	6. A Year's Memory

A/N: This was my attempt at poetry for theAvatar100 challenge: Spirits. 80 words. I don't really do poetry. But sometimes, well. Sometimes.

Disclaimer: I own everything about this except the inspiration – Sokka/Yue from Avatar: The Last AirBender

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A Year's Memory

The shifting coral of tulip blooms.  
The scudding drift of spring clouds.  
He would seek her there.

Green redolent of new-mown grass on the oasis.  
White jasmine scents the air.  
Another season just beyond his grasp.

Golden eyes of autumn draw his knife's blood,  
Brilliant red against the gold.  
But burnt brown or black in her sight.

Blue, cold as a glacier's heart, old as time  
Thus, sure as seasons' passings.  
And the moon shines over all.


	7. Heir

A/N: This was written for theavatar100 challenge #53: Line. The drabble presented there was a perfect 100 words, but I wanted to extend it a bit for It could be stronger at the sacrifice of the structure, and that's a choice I wanted to make.

Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Airbender. Don't own it, can't claim it, and am exempt thereby from litigation.

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Heir

Zuko eyed the Water Tribe delicacy with some trepidation. Squid eyes seemed to look back, so he closed his own and swallowed quickly, hardly chewing. It was, surprisingly, quite good. He looked for another.

"Ah. You are beginning to understand what you have to gain from the other nations."

"Thank you, Uncle. You have taught me much," Zuko bowed, allowing a small grin to cross his features, an expression seen more frequently of late. Yes, it had started with learning the bending forms of other people, but Iroh hadn't stopped there. And yes, the connections were starting to make sense.

He vaguely wondered when his uncle's good opinion had come to mean more than his own father's.

Iroh's blood-line was ended and would never take the throne. But there were other lines of inheritance.

The old man smiled.


	8. It Was Never Just A Game

A/N: The challenge word was: Gamble

Avtar100.

There were many lovely entries, especially focusing on the life choices aspect. Being me, I decided to go back to the root of the question, with only a throwback implication, since everything Aang does/learns has an impact on the future.

TITLE: It Was Never Just A Game

Challenge #54: Gamble

Community: Avatar-100

No. of Words: 100

Warnings: None.

"Shell, dice, cards, betting on sporting events – yeah, like racing. That's everything_ I_ know about, but you can bet if folks want to gamble on it, there's a way." Sokka grinned knowledgably at Aang.

"For once, he's right," Katara agreed. "I'm not saying all gambling's wrong; _everything_ we do is, I guess, a gamble. The point is, it's wrong to make bets on a sure thing.

Sokka rolled his eyes. There was a time and place to introduce a philosophical element. This wasn't it.

Could Toph still kick Aang's ass or not?


	9. A Justification of Sorts

Title: And they call me Herod…

In the interests of the holiday season, I give you reflections on messianic intent.

Disclaimer: Blah, blah, blah. Just cuz I don't own the characters does not mean I can't speculate on their actions; although admittedly posting such speculations does present a conundrum at law.

He remembered his first encounter with the Avatar. Well, at least, with _an_ avatar.

A young earthbender who had convinced himself that his creative use of his particular talent demonstrated a proclivity towards true airbending that, had their temples still existed, would have led to a fostering of his true nature and no dependency on clever shifting of stone to displace air and water. And yes, the fool had never managed to evince any sign of firebending beyond sending sparks flying.

Long Feng had been merely a raw recruit at the time.

So many more had passed through Ba Sing Se in his time, that when the true Avatar finally appeared he was long reconciled to the futility of the hero's appearance. He had seen the reports on the Fire Nation's progress, but also rested great confidence on the prowess of the Dai Li and the City's Walls. Surely it was possible to maintain a redoubt of sanity in a sea of chaos as long as practical realities were recognized. The Earth Kingdom survived on such. The Fire Nation should be so wise.

And really, who were the real masters when the people served only those they actually saw?

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I confess, I was raised in a Christian household (what does that really mean, anyway?). As a reasonably well-educated person, I've a solid grounding in both Old and New Testaments, and read bits of the Apocrypha and the Koran. A sprinkling of Buddist teachings, Native American creation stories, Gilgamesh, Homer, and various odds and ends that knocked the wind out of certainty and turned me into, at best, an agnostic…


	10. A Mistake

A/N: Written last summer for a friend, uncomfortable with incest (Like anyone is really comfortable with such a subject – I just stretched my brain to see a world in which it…might…just …work)

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Most of the time he couldn't help but admire her, even when they were children. She was adorable, clever, graceful, and, of course, a fire-bending genius. Younger than him, she still outshone him at everything, like a tiny brightly burning sun. Zuko knew that it was only by virtue of being first-born and male that he was in line for the Fire Lord's throne, and that by any other measure Azula was Ozai's true heir. He was oddly conflicted by this.

Zuko was innately honest. A part of him couldn't help but believe the Fire Nation deserved the best, strongest, smartest person on the throne, and he had not just his father's assessment but the evidence of his own experience to suggest that Azula would be that person rather than himself. She, of course, knew it as well. And Zuko felt guilty at the advantage of birth he held over his sister. So he honestly wasn't surprised at her resentment of him, and it seemed a fairly reasonable response on her part.

Which didn't mean that it didn't hurt, all of it. His father's obvious preference of his sister over him. His sister's resentment of his very existence. And the apparent lack in himself that fueled these reactions. Of course he had fallen back on his mother's adoration of him, on his uncle's indulgence, and on that streak of stubbornness, so evident in all of Sozin's line, to reconcile him to his place in the world and to inspire him to fight to deserve it.

So it was hardly surprising that his feelings regarding his sister were extraordinarily ambivalent as well. She was everything he wanted to be, everything he admired. Oh yes, she was ruthless and capable of great cruelty, but that ability to rise above the concerns of others was also necessary for a strong leader of the Fire Nation. He knew this. He may not be a prodigy but he was an excellent student, and the history of the Fire Nation was a clear example of the success of aggressive, strong leadership. So he struggled against his own sense of empathy on a daily basis, stove to harden his will as he hardened his body. And watched with a combination of admiration and resentment as, even as he honed himself into a closer approximation of the ideal his father sought, his sister seemed to achieve the pinnacle of that ideal seemingly effortlessly.

It had been three years since he had seen her, and her sudden appearance that evening at the spa had left him literally speechless. The promise of beauty in the child he had left behind was, even now, not fully realized in Azula. But she was still quite lovely, and Zuko's stomach clenched awkwardly at her arrival in a way that had nothing to do with either her apparent message or his surprise at seeing her.

Even as she struck against him he noted her exquisite form, and the sheer power she harnessed so easily moved him even as he was appalled to find himself her target.

He brooded on this for weeks, perhaps even more than he brooded over his final abandonment by his father. Perhaps over the years he had subconsciously anticipated his rejection without ever considering Azula's. On the surface, he disavowed the former while accepting without question the latter. And a tiny demon took root in his soul as he considered Azula's apparent perfection.

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Sometimes she would ask herself how many sisters saw anything to admire in their older brothers. Over time she decided that it was probably a normal condition, despite the obvious evidence that brothers were inevitably inferior to their siblings. It was a result of an absurd early dependence fostered by parents and idle servants on that other family member too young to be other than awed by the adoration of the younger sibling. An atavistic response unsubdued by the intellect.

But then, so few girls were capable of any intellectual assessment of the object of their affections anyway.

Zuko was not, really, disappointing. He was capable of great sweetness and even some humor, although she valued neither highly. On the other hand, he'd inherited his family's beauty and strength of character – she found it almost impossible to subdue him. He couldn't keep up with her in the classroom or the training field, but then, who could? She loved his fierce independence, and that quixotic streak of integrity was, what? Fascinating?

He was so easy to manipulate. But then, Azula had been manipulating adults all her life, and her friends were mere putty in her hands. Again, it was Zuko's independent streak that almost charmed her. And then there was his position as their father's heir. Ah yes. Just because he was first. And because he was a boy. No real fault of his own. But there it was.

No matter what affection she might have felt for him. No matter what silly games they had shared when so much younger. No matter that when she saw him again as a young adult, years after his refusal to fight his father had resulted in a horribly disfiguring scar, he appeared as a strikingly appealing young man. He was in the way.

It was infinitely easier that he had run. The reports on his unsuccessful hunt of the avatar helped to diminish him – she could not imagine a child and his friends eluding the full force of the Fire Nation for so long, let alone her.

But in the dark in her own bed she remembered how his scarred face only emphasized the perfection of what remained. On the edge of manhood, even in disgrace, he moved with feral grace and power. She loved the arrogance of the thrust of his chin, the line of his shoulders, and she acknowledged that even as she had improved in strength and power so, too, he had grown.

He was as close as she had ever seen to a match of her own ability. What a pity he was her brother.

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The battle had moved beyond them hours ago.

It was surprising, given she was the chief protagonist. But he was her number two quarry, so as the other targets moved further afield, and Azula continued to focus on her brother, her associates had no qualms in following the avatar and his friends as they retreated along the stream-course down the valley.

Each was surprised to find that, finally, they were quite evenly matched. Her fire-bending was still the stronger, but something in the way he wielded his broadswords as he fought focused his own fire-bending in a way that perfectly countered her moves.

They were too close. She had not had a chance to practice the elaborate separation of yin and yang to create a devastating lightning attack.

So, all that knife-play had not been wasted.

Imagine that.

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He wished he had the luxury of watching her move for poetry's sake. Somewhere in the back of his mind, haiku were forming even as he sweated against her.

Now this was life! Who had trained him in those wasted years when they were children? _This _was art. _This_ was life on the blade's edge. Even if she did not persevere – impossible! – it would all be worth it for this!

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In the end, it was the water-bending move that decided the battle. He had dropped the swords at that point.

Zuko was too much a stranger to irony to appreciate it. Iroh was too deeply involved in directing the avatar and his friends in the switch from defense to offence to be available to instruct him.

And that, perhaps, was all to the good.

Azula was so surprised to see the lightning that she had finally managed to summon float harmlessly through his body, only to decimate the near wall of the gorge in which they fought, that he was able to fling himself upon her, roughly twisting her arms behind her as he bore his greater weight upon her own form.

She struggled beneath him, but Zuko had not wasted hours spent fighting hand-to-hand against a female opponent in practice for nothing.

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There they were. Breath-to-breath, heart-to-heart. One set of golden eyes confronting a deeper gold.

In defiance and desperation, she strained up to kiss him, full on the lips.

For an instant that could perhaps have dragged into eons, he looked at her.

Then he plunged to savage her mouth, and his hands dragged across her body in a hunger she had never known, despite lovers she had ceased to count since passing puberty.

She responded in kind, heedless of prohibitions, and guided her brother's hands in a search that would have confounded their father if he had known.

Zuko growled deep in his throat, even as his calloused thumb found its way within the folds of her inner garments, finding satisfaction at last in the pebbled flesh surrounding her erect nipple. She rolled her hips against him.

His response was an answering erectness of his manhood, and he plumbed the depths of her mouth with his tongue, twisting savagely as he tasted smoke-hallowed recesses.

She had thought to chastise him with overt sexuality. She had thought he would back down. She had forgotten that he was her father's son. She was wrong. Dead wrong.

He had managed so completely to ignore his relationship to her that he could only think of her beauty and antagonism.

"Bitch."

"Whore's son."

He bit her lip hard before she could say else. Her legs spread even as he ripped fabric aside, searing seams with flame from his fingers. Silken skin only served to enflame him further, and her writhing against him now was more provocation than protest.

He thrust himself within her as he would his broadsword. Or, at least, so he told himself. He could not deny the satisfaction that he felt as he buried his length inside her was anything comparable to a swords' thrust against a foe. How disappointing to have to disassociate himself from this very comfortable metaphor….

And how incomparably satisfying to simply thrust, again and again and, even again, until finally, he felt her collapse against him in a shuddering finale, his name hissed even as it faded into incoherence.

The sensations as she climaxed around him surprised him; he could not separate imagination from reality even as he rode the wave of his own climax, maintaining his grip on her wrists with one hand, his other hand clenched on the flesh of her hip even as his teeth eased their bite on her throat.

The Fire Lord's family was oddly famous for its amorousness, this despite the production of relatively few offspring. Then again, fecundity was rarely a measure of the number of women bedded. An unfortunate truism. And Zuko was in no position to prove otherwise.

She hated it as much as she loved it. Her body trembled in weakness from the assault against it, and she would have been proved a liar had she said she regretted anything other than looking up at her brother rather than looking down.

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She clung to him as he had not experienced since they were barely more than toddlers, hiding from the fury of a storm.

And the memory made him stroke her back gently, murmur soft idiocies into her ear before he noticed the sudden relaxation of her limbs. Her elbow sharp against his ribs as a knee thrust into his groin and a fist into his gut reminded him that, in fact, they had both grown up. With another kick she broke away, and a sheet of flame covered her escape.

She had been no virgin conquest. Nor even sister defiled.

Quite simply, it had been what it had always been between them. A battle. An exchange of love and hate.

And Zuko still admired her.


	11. Song of Hokoda

Song of Hakoda:

While among the southern Water Tribe, there was no such thing,

Hakoda was still a man of means.

While leadership had ceased to exist in such a tiny, fractured tribe,

They looked to Hokoda all the same, two years and more.

Where Tribal members were all family, in the South?

To claim ascendancy was blasphemy.

Forgotten, forbidden history remembered the strength of the South.

But the living remembered the remnants taking hold together.

Those who survived did not stand alone,

But lifted others in their wake.

As Hokada lifted the warriors to fight the good fight.

As his children lifted the world –

Earth, water, and fire

Spinning in the abandoned airs' currents, bringing new life.

New balance.

Old as time, sweet as spring snowmelt.

A man of means leans upon the people,

Leadership no more than a memory.

His blood kin are no more,

But Hokada is still family.

Nothing will be forgotten,

The living pass on their reverence.

No one who survives stands alone.

All are lifted in their wake.

They struggle to keep faith with a good fight

Children raise their eyes to heaven-

Earth, water, and fire

Dancing in air's joyful currents of life

Celebrating balance.

And Time.


	12. Toph's Choice

A/N: I've been reading AJ Rayne's works and couldn't help myself. Her portrayal of Sokka/Toph needed something of a bridge between canon and her world, and, let's face it, Aang has been sadly neglected. I hope she'll forgive me for treading on her turf.

Disclaimer: Intellectual Property claims wholly respected: in the interests of fandom and no loss of property interests I'm sure we can avoid any litigation. In other words – I surrender!

"I don't get it. Hey, he's one of my best friends. I love him like a brother – you know that. But I still don't get it," Aang didn't look at her, keeping his eyes on the shifting hues of color in the sky as the sun edged ever closer to the purpling horizon. His heels dug in to the hard stone of the wall beneath them unconsciously as only an earth-bender could do.

Aware as another earth-bender of this tiny shift in the structure they sat upon, Toph was surprised at the vehemence of Aang's concern.

"It's no big deal, and I'd appreciate it if you'd just forget about it," she said placidly, idly wondering how her long-time interest in their traveling companion had finally come to the Avatar's attention, and just why he seemed to care.

"Yeah, well, whatever. I guess it's none of my affair," He said grumpily. "You'll do what you want – you always have. But we're friends, aren't we? I mean, I'd just like to _understand_. After all, how'm I supposed to be the grand arbiter of the world's disputes when I can't even figure out what my own friends are doing and why?"

There was just the slightest edge of bitterness to Aang's voice that reminded Toph how very isolating it must be to be the Avatar. For the first time she questioned the wisdom of accepting his status as a monk when they'd met as children, and closing her heart off to all thought of him as anything but her earth-bending student, the world's savior, and her friend.

Too late now. Not that it would have mattered. Even a _blind_ idiot could have seen his devotion to Katara, monk be damned.

Toph shrugged, more aware of the sinking sun by the changing sounds in the environment than through any change of heat or light on her blind eyes. The earth moved, birdsong changed and different insects made their presence known with the diurnal shift.

"Don't sweat it, Twinkletoes. I'm flattered you care, truly I am. But it's not something you need to worry about. And it's not like Sokka's gonna do anything. I mean, he's as oblivious as ever, right?"

"He's got no clue?" Aang's tension relaxed a bit, although he wasn't exactly sure why.

"Nope. I think it's part of his charm. He honestly never seems to see it coming when someone actually cares about him. For all his posturing he's absurdly innocent when it comes to actual come-ons from the opposite sex," Toph pulled a peach from the bag at her side, offering it Aang to split for both of them, her face still turned to the setting sun. "Not that I'd ever come on to him, the smart-ass."

Aang accepted the peach without thinking, air-bending it easily in half and popping the pit to disappear in the darkness below the wall. It was ripe and juicy in his hand, and he opted against dividing it any further as he handed her a half with a sideways glance.

"Not like he hasn't had plenty of practice," Aang muttered, his mind caught by the gross unfairness of it over the years. Here he was, master of all four elements, and the wise-ass non-bender seemed to catch the attention of the most interesting girls. It was just a good thing Katara was his sister… Aang shuddered. To think of the sheer unjustness of the world.

It didn't help when Toph slung an arm across his shoulders in apparent sympathy. It didn't help at all, especially considering his emergence into adolescence's unruly emotional rampage over his admittedly not always clear thinking to begin with. Aang huddled to shrink his overgrown fifteen-year-old body back into the twelve-year-old's dimensions that Toph had first become accustomed to.

He'd shot up in height, and could now look Zuko directly in the eyes, although he knew he'd never catch Sokka – _he_ towered over them all now, even topping his father and Bato. Unfortunately, although Katara had not matched her brother in this race for height Toph seemed to have taken up the challenge, and just as he had barely managed to claim to overlook her as her student at twelve, at fifteen he found himself still too close to eye-to-eye with the matchless earth-bender.

The only solace he found in the thought of Toph's height was to chortle a bit at the many levels on which the young Fire Lord must have felt challenged: Toph was as great a bender – if not greater – and she was almost certainly wealthier; would she one day be taller as well? It tickled his sense of humor even as he registered acknowledgment of the importance of strength against strength as a component of balance and how easily strength could be shifted to weakness.

Aang hated it that he thought of life now in these terms.

Especially when Toph's arm across his shoulders raised sensations he'd sworn to leave behind, even as he'd turned from Katara's smile.

"Okay, so tell me, please. What do you, the greatest earth-bender ever – even Bumi agrees – sees in Sokka? I mean, you could have anyone…" he paused. Had he gone too far? "What is it? Okay, he's a good guy. He is pretty clever and I admit he pulled our butts out of trouble on more than one occasion, but he certainly did the opposite as well. And yeah, you can count on him to steer you straight – Sokka may not always choose the _best_ path, but he always knows who we should trust, and he never really loses direction. I guess he's pretty reliable. Okay, fine. In some ways he's a rock…" Aang paused, uncertain what to say next.

Toph listened to the sounds of the gathering darkness, the heartbeat and more subtle shifting of chemical balances within her companion, abandoning herself to the broader perception of the world around them.

With a sigh that seemed to muffle the world in the Avatar's sheer strength, Aang finally continued, "I get it now. That's it, isn't it? Sokka's a lodestar for you, an unmoving rock."

"I know he can be wrong. And he's been an awful ass at times, hasn't he? But at heart, he was always right, wasn't he? Aang, didn't you trust Sokka before you trusted yourself?" Toph implored him for understanding, and with an odd sense of peace, he found acceptance in something that he finally understood he'd been following without recognizing for some time.

"He _is_ an awful ass sometimes, Toph. But, yeah, I don't really know of a heart to trust more than Sokka's when it comes to following the truth," Aang swallowed hard, knowing he'd lost yet another heart's desire to someone else.

The sun was buried deep within the horizon, and Aang looked over his shoulder at the climbing moon in the eastern sky. It was still too young to see any woman's face upon it, and Aang knew full well that it was his imagination that stamped Yue's visage upon its face.

As bridge between the worlds he prayed for his friends.


	13. Sokka's reasons 1

As the sky before him blazed in Fire Nation red, gold, salmon and every shade in-between in a spectacular seaborne sunset, Sokka idly stroked Appa's shoulder. _When did colors become political,_ he wondered, _and when did I learn to look for the difference?_

At least his head didn't itch anymore, the sides finally grown in sufficiently so he no longer felt preternaturally aware of exactly where his head was in relation to everything else in the friggin' world! How must it be for Aang? Luckily, he'd slept through the worst of it.

Katara and Toph were huddled with Aang around their campfire on an island not far off-shore from Roku's Crescent Isle. They were bringing him up to speed on all he'd missed while he recovered from his …death. Katara had suggested that Sokka was, for all his good will, somewhat lacking in the tact necessary to tell this story properly, and his Fire Nation uniform still obviously made Aang's eye twitch.

So there he was, sitting on the ridge watching the sun set with Appa.

No big.

It meant he didn't have to hide dealing with the strange dichotomy of his skin crawling at the thought of willingly donning Fire Nation garb – and admitting how comfortable it was, except for the weight of the damned armor.

It meant he didn't have to hide how terrified he felt at the loss of the Earth Kingdom forces, and how much he'd relied on the rule of force to route the Fire Lord. Much as he'd outwardly accepted that Aang's role, and thus his friends' role in supporting him, was to face down the Fire Lord, Sokka had struggled mightily with the sheer prospect. Everything his agile mind told him, even with the evidence of Aang's victory at the North Pole, insisted that taking the battle to the Fire Lord himself meant grappling with forces beyond anything they'd ever dealt with.

Sokka wanted something he could understand to counter it with. A natural understanding of physics suggested that a young, not fully trained Avatar may not measure up so well against a fully vested Fire Lord, surrounded by maybe battalions of fire-benders prepared to die in his service. Sokka was fully prepared to be there by Aang's side, but he'd feel a hell of a lot better if he knew he'd done his best to line up the rest of the world's finest in reserve.

As he saw it, that was _still_ his role. The girls would continue to strengthen Aang as the Avatar. Sokka would bring as much of the ordinary world's support to his effort as was humanly possible. This was still possible! He knew he had a ready tongue, and he resolved to use it, even if it meant taking him away from his friends for a short time.

And here Sokka's promise to his father grated. Katara was so damned competent as a warrior that she actually spurned Sokka's now admittedly tacit attempts to protect her. Much as it galled his pride to admit, she was far more competent as a protector than he was. As for protecting Aang? In terms of physical wherewithal, it was, and had been for longer than anyone would admit, a joke. Still, Sokka had one up on everyone else that was a point he was well prepared to exploit. For all Aang's slipperiness and willingness to lie, he did it badly. And for all Sokka's pontificating on the virtues of truthfulness, he lied rather well. He suspected it betrayed an unhealthy understanding of what it was that drove others to deviate from the truth. Unpleasant of a truth as it was to confront, on the sands of Chameleon Bay Sokka had seen no other recourse.

He wouldn't get to play hero, and the spirits would know that he'd be a far cry from being able to claim a clean heart. Ah well, so many lives had been already paid to the goal of a free world against the Fire Nation; maybe the sacrifice of his soul was not so very much.

And so Sokka drew a line. There were things he was prepared to do, pain he was prepared to bear, and even approbation over time his soul would endure to make the world a better place.

As the azure twilight overcame the brilliant colors of the setting sun, the bowed shoulders of what appeared to be an aged soldier straightened into a young man's full height

As the full moon came into her glory, the moon spirit smiled, content in the evidence of her lover's strength.


End file.
